3 and a 1/2 snouts up (:)(:)(:)(: for Chi-Raq (2015) directed and produced by Spike Lee, written by Kevin Willmott and Spike Lee and starring Teyonah Parris, Nick Cannon, Wesley Snipes, Jennifer Hudson and Samuel L. Jackson. We finally got around to watching this film last night. With its gang-bang hip hop opening sequences and rhyming lines, at first I had trouble getting into it. I had completely forgotten the conceit. Ten minutes or so in, I began to see that the main character was not in fact a gang-banger, but his woman, Lysistrata, concerned with the ongoing casualties of the raging gang war in their Chicago neighborhood, hence “Chi-Raq.” Just as Lysistrata’s neighbor asks her what power the women might hold over their gang-banger boyfriends, I literally slammed my hand against my forehead and said “Lysistrata, duh!” They are, of course, as in the ancient Greek comedy Lysistrata by Aristophanes, going to withhold sex until the “Greeks” and “Spartans” lay down their arms and agree to peace.
Not everyone was fed Greek drama as a childhood staple, but I a) spent my first two years of life in Greece b) my father, activist/professor Prescott S. “Nick” Nichols, was also a playwright and c) one of his plays, Hawks and Doves, was basically Lysistrata set in the Vietnam War era, so yeah, for me if not for you, this shoulda been “duh.”
Right after the women swear their “no peace, no pussy” oath, the movie takes off. And while the chorus of women and the chorus of old men (portrayed as Knights of Columbus here) rhyme and speak in unison, it helps that the lead characters speak like real people.
Bonus points to my heartthrob John Cusack as Father Mike Corridan based on the real-life Father Michael Pfleger, the Catholic pastor of the mostly African-American Saint Sabina parish in Chicago’s Auburn-Gresham neighborhood. It’s reported that Pfleger adopted two sons and became the foster parent of third in defiance of church authorities. The third son was killed by stray gunfire which seems to have launched Pfleger into activism. This is a perfect role for leftwing activist and lifelong Chicago-denizen Cusack; his (and Spike’s) genuine anger at the abandonment of his congregation by white America burns through.
I just browsed through the real play Lysistrata (available in ebook in an instant on the public library app Libby) to see how closely Chi-Raq cleaved to the plot. Turns out, pretty closely. In Lysistrata they take over the Acropolis; in Chi-Raq, the Armory. In Lysistrata the women’s chorus swears an oath and the chorus of old men vows to undermine the women’s effort. In Chi-Raq it is unclear how the boycott spreads so quickly, but soon women of the whole world join in. And, I’ll tease you with this, in the real Lysistrata, there is no closing public sex sequence.
In all, I found this not a perfect film experience but a wonderful creative, humorous approach to the seemingly intractable issue of gang wars (and white indifference). With all the (frankly, ludicrous) complaints about waning lack of television content in the pandemic, here’s another movie to add to your list if you didn’t see it when it came out.
